Can you imagine hearing your little girl get shot in the face, twice, at point blank range?
That's how ten-year-old Brisenia Flores of Arivaca, Arizona died. In May of 2009, her home was invaded by 41-year-old vigilante Shawna Forde and two men - Jason "Gunny" Bush and Albert Gaxiola - who killed Brisenia's father, Raul, before murdering the innocent little girl as she begged for her life. Brisenia's mother, Gina, survived, called 911 and even exhanged gunfire with the criminals.
Forde was convicted of the crime and sentenced to death weeks ago. A jury is deliberating on Bush's fate as I type this, and Gaxiola will be tried in June.
Forde is a trip. I stumbled upon a "Justice for Shawna Forde" website where she trashes Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik and blames him for the Giffords massacre in Tucson. She praises Arizona Governor Jan Brewer for signing SB 1070, the infamous and controversial anti-illegal immigration measure ("If they's brown and don't have they papers, we gonna deport 'em"), in April of 2010. She complains about jailers tampering with her mail and writing her up for "extremely petty incidents" like passing out candy, and even takes a swipe at the ACLU for opposing SB 1070 and deciding not to pursue a "white racial profiling" complaint against Sheriff Dupnik. If she was as busy prior to her incarceration as her website is, it's surprising she even had time to mastermind the murder of a young girl.
Forde had ties to anti-immigration groups like the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps (MCDC) and the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). (FAIR denies she was a member.) She founded the Minutemen American Defense (MAD) organization after getting kicked out of MCDC for being "unstable." Makes you wonder how many other unstable, racist misfits are walking around out there, taking the vile, irresponsible rantings of the Limbaughs, O'Reillys and Coulters to heart and deciding to cleanse society of "people who aren't like us" like Brisenia.
Better writers than I have criticized the media for not providing much coverage of the slaughter in Arivaca. USA Today columnist Raul A. Reyes wrote, "Cable outlets did not give Brisenia the 24/7 coverage afforded household names like Chandra Levy, Lacey Peterson, JonBenet Ramsey, and Natalee Holloway. Maybe Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post was correct when he opined that America requires its damsels in distress to be white...and preferably middle class. Since Brisenia was neither, apparently her life mattered less to our society."
It looks like justice will be served in this case, albeit in relative silence. I'm still sad, though. Brisenia was the same age as my kids and had a shy smile similar to my son's. Her demise should have been national news. Hers should be a household name. Her life should have mattered more. If she had been white and with a Member of Congress...
Sources: The Daily Beast, Huffington Post, www.briseniaflores.com, Arizona Daily Star, "Justice for Shawna Forde" website.
I heard about this, so sad and senseless. I'm fuzzy on the details...but from what I remember these 3 whack-jobs weren't even at the right house. I hope they get the book, and then some.
ReplyDeleteMy understanding is that Forde thought Brisenia's dad was a big-time drug dealer - he had been arrested on drug charges before - so she thought she would fund her fledgling border patrol efforts with the money she and her thugs stole from Raul's mobile home. They gained access by impersonating law enforcement and got....nothing. Brisenia died for nothing.
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